I Don't Wanna Be The Guy
by Don't Use Quills
Summary: To be fair America sucks at dueling. Our best duelist was a little girl, and that's burned Americans up for years. Now these people think they can make ME the one to change it all? I don't think so.
1. Announcement

I was running, through the streets of Washington D.C. Jumping over benches, running around cars anything to get me away from _them_. They shouted at me, as they ran to catch up. There were two of them, one taller one shorter. Finally I had gotten to a good hiding spot, and I laid in wait. The two stopped in the plaza where I had hidden and began to speak to one another.

"Kevin, where do you think that he went?"

"Beats me, who would have thought he'd be so against dueling?"

Ugh, dueling, my least favorite activity. The U.S. pushed it so heavily though it was almost impossible to avoid. It all has to do with politics, and respect from the rest of the world.

"Well, then I guess we'll have to go without him."

"Oh well no big loss."

The voices were going away now, and after a few more minutes I finally left my hiding place. Those two people were Chris Dolan and Kevin Miller, my classmates and sometimes friends. We all went to the same boarding school Roosevelt Duel Academy, but the poor excuse for dueling that we did was nothing like the fancy duels with holograms. These were strictly table duels only, which might have been the reason dueling in America was so lame to begin with. To put it lightly American duelist were atrocious, and even historically the best American duelist ever were a little girl and Bandit Keith.

Roosevelt was located not too far from the White House and was said to be "one of the best dueling schools in America." Not a very big accomplishment when America is officially the worst dueling country on the planet. Still the Roosevelt building was impressive to look at. The large brown building set itself apart from the others around it by it's large clock. The campus was snuggly placed inside of one block in between a theatre and an area full of restaurants. If you wanted to go to this school for anything but dueling it was probably one of the best. Too bad there was nothing but dueling, and unfortunately people like me were forced to go here in hopes of improving America's standing in the global duel community.

The lobby of Roosevelt or Roose as we call it had a high ceiling and a shiny marble floor. On this dark September night, the lights of building shined brightly and gave the place a welcoming environment. Students buzzed from place to place most speaking with a frantic tone. I wondered what they could be talking about, what could be wrong. Someone tapped me on my shoulder and I saw that it was Chris

"I see you gave us the slip," he said.

"You know how I feel about dueling," I said.

"And you know how I feel about it, can't you just give it a chance?"

"I give it a chance all the time Chris, I wouldn't be here if I hadn't given it a chance. Look where that chance has put me! Away from home, away from my family, and stuck doing something I've never enjoyed."

Chris didn't have an answer for me then. Chris was a chipper fellow, his bright yellow hair matched his bubbly personality. If he were a girl I was sure he would have some type of valley girl accent even though he's from Ohio.

"Well, there wasn't much for you to see anyway," Chris said, "Miller and I couldn't find a single person to duel, it seems like everyone is studying for midterms."

Shoot, midterms had completely slipped my mind. I wonder what it would be like to live in an earlier time, back when schools ended in June instead of started. Year round school wasn't fun, and at a place like Roosevelt it almost never ended. I got to go home for about a week before I was shipped back to school. Between the lack of breaks and constant testing, they hoped we would turn to dueling to take some of the stress away. No wonder then that there were so many students graduating to psychiatric hospitals instead of colleges.

"I can help you study," Chris said, "if you duel me."

I sighed loudly, Dolan was really going to force me to duel him. We walked back to the room that we shared and sat down at "The Table" as Chris called it. Chris pulled his cards out of his pocket, he never let them get far away from him, I on the other hand pulled them out of a box on my belt.

"Come on Dan, I've never seen a pro black duelist before isn't that some good motivation?"

"You mean other than all the pro duelist in the Africa circuit right?"

Chris silently shuffled his cards, having lost his argument.

Chris: 2000

Dan: 2000

"Why do we use 2000 points instead of the 4000 the rest of the world uses," Chris said drawing his hand.

"They say competition," I said starting off.

"First I'll play Giant Rat (1400/1450) in attack mode and play a face down." I was surprised by myself, usually I never had such good hands, even if I did they never came together so well.

"Alright then," Chris said, "I'll play Acrobat Monkey (1000/1800) in defense mode and end." I knew Chris played with machine monsters, which were considered the best cards in America. In fact, Americans in general only play with Earth monsters, yet another reason we aren't very good.

"I'll attack your monkey and end." I took the card off the table and put it into his graveyard.

**Chris: 1600**

**Dan: 2000**

"Aw why'd you have to do that," Chris whined, "now I have to summon something else. Like another Acrobat Monkey! Only this time I'll use the card Rush Recklessly to add 700 points to his attack." Chris placed his other copy of the card on the table. He then took my card off the table and put it on the floor.

**Chris: 1600**

**Dan: 1700**

"Now I can use Giant Rat's effect to bring another monster to the field, I choose Bubonic Vermin (900/600), now I'll summon another Bubonic Vermin and end." Chris smirked, the lack of attacking power in my deck was easy for him to exploit.

"This one is done! I sacrifice Acrobat Monkey for Machine King (2200/2000) next I play Limiter Removal and attack for game!"

**Chris: 1600**

**Dan: 0**

Someone rushed into our room, it was a teacher and he looked very scared.

"Both of you two, lets move now! Something is going on, on the TV!"

Chris and I were up in seconds and sprinted down the hallway, many other students were running with us. What could be happening? We go to the TV room and saw on the large screen television a duel was going on. Not just any duel though a duel with Rebecca Hawkins in it, the best duelist in all of America. She was a little old lady now, it had been a long time since she had become American champion and she had kept the position all this time. It looked like she was dueling an international duelist, I didn't recognize them.

"Oh man this looks bad," one student said. I looked down at the ticker where the life points were located and winced. Rebecca was losing 8000 to 100. Whoever this duelist was they must have been good. He had a card called Turret Warrior which he used to end the duel. The entire room shouted in anger, furious at the best American losing without so much as a scratch of damage to her opponent.

Suddenly the duelist took the microphone, he had a blank stare, and an expressionless face. His hair was a shaggy brown, it made him look as though he had crawled out of the woods.

"The time of America is officially over," he said plainly before walking off. This drove the people around me to get even angrier, cursing and throwing things. Whatever he meant by that, it couldn't be good.


	2. Hope

The room was dimly lit and the low hum of plates clattering and talking gave the mess hall a sort of creepy feeling. Chris and I were sitting in the middle of the table, we were waiting for Kevin to show up. The entire school was on edge, fights had sprung up all over the school. That duelist announcement had made everyone angry, and even the slightest thing got on someone's bad side.

Chris and I ate quietly, after that announcement no one was in the mood to talk. We took it different ways I think. Chris might have seen it as an insult to America, and was using it to work harder. I however took it as something everyone knew for a long time, and no one had said. For years now as America fell further and further behind in Duel Monsters it seemed all other things the country had were falling apart as well. Dueling had a grip on the world that didn't appear to be waning anytime soon. Economic, Industrial, Social, even Cultural influence fell apart as soon as America couldn't duel. To replace us was Japan, China, and Russia all countries full of the best of the best duelist.

It's funny really, although dueling turned out to be a bad thing for the U.S. for the rest of the world it was a blessing. Turmoil in the Middle East ended, troubles in Africa gone, and even Taiwan became its own country. A large benefit for the cost of America. So what could the person's statement mean anymore than what's already happening? It couldn't get any worse could it? Who was I kidding yes it could, this draft was proof of it. America was getting desperate, and who knew what would happen next.

"Hey sad sacks wake up," a voice shouted from the entrance.

Everyone in the room looked to see Kevin Miller standing proud in the front holding an envelope. He walked over to our table and got on top of it. He emptied the envelope and pulled out two official looking pieces of paper. He pulled Chris up to the table and handed him a sheet.

"See this," he said holding the paper, "this is a president's scholarship to Duel Academia in Japan. I don't know what that guy was talking about, but America is just getting started!"

I saw that Chris also had one, the people in the mess hall seemed slightly uplifted by the news.

"We leave tomorrow, and then we'll show those Japanese just who they're messing with!" Kevin's statement reminded me of something, the duelist was Japanese. I remember reading somewhere that the Japanese were said by other foreign nations to look down on the United States. There were dozens of stories of horrible things happening to American students in Japan, the most coming from Duel Academy.

Kevin seemed so confident standing up on that table, his brown hair was covered in sweat, probably from all the running around he did telling people. Even Chris seemed ready to take on the world pumping his fist up into the air.

"We show them, the real U.S. tomorrow!" People clapped and shouted, even teachers were cheering on this pep rally. It was turning into quite a show, but the word tomorrow struck me. _Tomorrow_, what in the world would I do without them?

Soon the cheering died down, and Chris and Kevin got off the table. I took them both and pulled them out into the hallway.

"I just found out today, don't blame me," Kevin said automatically.

"Yeah I guessed that," I said, "but don't you find this all a little fishy?"

"What do you mean?"

"Think about this guys, the last American to go to Duel Academy was the one in-"

"The Incident," Chris said, "but things are different now, that was an accident.

"Let me finish," I said. "That was ten years ago. The last time anyone has gone there on a scholarship was at least fifty years ago. So why now are they doing this again?"

"Clearly they want to reopen relations with Japan," Kevin said. "Sure that student is still in a coma but we can't stay mad at them forever."

"You don't think it has anything to do with what that guy said on television do you," Chris said.

"No, no way, the dean himself told me that this was an ongoing thing," Kevin said. "They've been eyeing us for months maybe even a year. They say were the best duelist around and that four of us will be going to Japan tomorrow, after this ceremony where we meet the president."

"That isn't a lot of time then for us to say goodbye to our families or anything," Chris said, "or to Dan."

"We can't do anything about our families, I guess we can just send letters," Kevin said, "for Dan however, I think one night on the town would be enough."

I looked from Kevin to Chris and we all grinned, one night would surely be enough.


	3. Alone

The night life was buzzing, all across Washington D.C. Everywhere we went on the streets people swarmed us, they oo-ed and ah-ed at Chris and Kevin. The President's scholarship was a big deal. News of it had spread fast as fireworks lit up the skies with their names. I was surprised the city was so accepting, clearly they had not seen either of them duel.

To be fair around these parts Chris and Kevin were fantastic duelist, but I had a fear that they would be exposed in Japan. For now though all we could do was enjoy the party.

"This is great," Chris said signing an autograph. Kevin was off talking to a group of girls and I was sitting on a park bench watching it all. There was jazz singing all over

the park and people of all ages were out to see the new "Champions of D.C." I was happy for them, after the scare of yesterday it was good to get some good news.

"Chris have you tried calling your parent's yet," I called into the crowd.

"What, oh no, I'll get to it later," he said. For some strange reason I didn't think he would get to it. Kevin seemed even worse, becoming increasingly absorbed with the girls who surrounded him. It seemed like the fame was getting to them, but what could I do?

"Hey you guys should duel," one of the people in the crowd said. Soon a chant of duel rose up from the crowd and the people cleared a space for them. Two people came forward and presented each person with a duel disk.

"This'll show you guys what it's like in Japan," they said. Kevin slipped it on and smirked at it. He turned it on and put his deck in. Chris on the other hand had trouble getting it on his arm, and one of the crowd members had to come forward to help him with it.

"You ready Dolan," Kevin said.

"Always, Miler," Chris replied.

Kevin: 4000

Chris: 4000

"Hey why are the life points so huge," Chris said.

"It's the standard for duel disk," said the man who provided them.

"Now that we have that out of the way, I'll start," Kevin said taking a card. He slipped it on the disc and a grey mechanical soldier with a rocket launcher appeared.

"I played Machina Sniper (1800/800) for anyone in the audience wondering," Kevin boasted.

"Are you done yet," Chris shouted across the field. Kevin glared and ended his turn.

"All right fine, I play Gear Golem the Moving Fortress (800/2200) in defense mode." I noticed that unlike the table matches the attack and defense of each monster was displayed on a projection as well.

"Next I set two card, your move Miller."

Kevin smiled at this and drew his card. Both competitors bathed in the cheers of the crowd, they took in the noise, the cheering, and the atmosphere. It was a lot more we were used to, but it was a welcome turn of events.

"Let me make things more interesting, I summon Machina Soldier (1600/1500) and play the spell Double Summon. Now I sacrifice both cards to summon Machina Fortress (2500/1600)!"

The crowd wooted and cheered at the appearance of the best monster in Kevin's deck. Even Chris seemed impressed that it was able to come out so quickly.

"Attack!" The machine aimed it's guns and rained missles down on the defending monster.

"I'll set a card and end," Kevin said.

Chris drew his card and he had the same look on his face he had during our duel yesterday. Something was about to happen, something big.

"I play my face down card Monster Reborn to bring back Gear Golem and next I'll sacrifice him to bring out MY ace Machine King (2200/2000)!" An even bigger response came from the people gathered as a second large machine appeared on the field.

"And thanks to his effect your monster only makes him stronger! Finally I'll reveal a facedown Rush Recklessly which increases his attack to 3000! Charge Machine King!"

Chris' large machine bore down on Kevin's fortress and destroyed it causing Kevin to wince.

**Kevin: 3500**

**Chris: 4000**

"Not so fast, Dolan you activated Fortress effect," Kevin said, "when fortress is destroyed by battle I can pick one card and destroy it and I pick Machine King." Missles came from the ground and rained down on the robot turning it into scrap. The crowd yelled the loudest it had all day at the even match so far.

"Fine I end then," Chris said.

"Time to even the score then," Kevin said, "I summon Machina Soldier again and activate his effect. Since he was summoned while I had no other monsters I can summon another Machina monster and I choose another Machina Sniper!"

One machine with a blade for and arm and the machine with the gun appeared. Things didn't look good for Chris.

"Now attack him directly both machines!" The first machine ran forward and slashed at Chris with his blade, while the other shot him with a rocket launcher.

**Kevin: 3500**

**Chris: 600**

"I think this will be your last turn Chris," Kevin said, "I end."

Chris drew his card in a cold sweat, it didn't look like he had any answer to the machines Kevin had pulled out.

"I summon Machine King Prototype (1600/500)" A less advanced version of Chris machine king took the field. A robot with springs in its legs and painted red.

"Now I'll play a face down," Chris said.

"You and these Machine King's stupid effects," Kevin shouted. Although only a prototype it still had the same effect as the other.

"I'll just set one monster and end then."

This was the duel here, whatever Chris drew would decide the game. From the look on his face though, he had what he wanted.

"I'll set a card and let you go buddy." The crowd was quiet now, confused by Chris' decision, how could he defeat Kevin with moves like that? Kevin however was laughing at his decision.

"You made a bad mistake, Chris. You probably though Fortress was my best monster and once I summon another machine you'll use Limiter Removal to knock off my best monster, but your mistaken." Everyone including Chris was shocked, what was this new monster Kevin was talking about?

"First take a look at my flip summoned Machina Defender (1200/1800) and thanks to his effect I can bring one Commander Covington to my hand from my deck."

Kevin took out his deck and got a card out of it to put in his hand.

"Now I'll summon Commander Covington (1000/600) and activate his effect. Now I sacrifice Sniper, Soldier, and Defender to bring out the newest addition to my deck Machina Force (4600/4100)!"

The crowd was on it's feet now cheering on the incredibly strong monster. Personally I thought it was a little bit of overkill. The machine was the largest thing I had ever seen and it had extra rockets and missiles to go along with it.

"Attack and end this!" The machine released thousands of missiles that struck the Chris. It was definitely overkill.

**Kevin: 3500**

**Chris: 0**

Chris and Kevin walked toward each other as the holograms faded and shook hands. The crowds cheered their sportsmanship just as much as their duel. I tried to walk toward them but the people were getting in between us. They were saying something I couldn't hear and started to walk off with the crowd. I tripped in the grass and fell behind, it was right then that I noticed what the rest of this year would be like. As I sat in the dark park laying in the grass I realized just what alone felt like.


	4. Heavy Losses

I itched under the suit the school had provided me. It had brown pants and a brown jacket. Apparently brown was the school color because it was the same suits given to Kevin and Chris. I stood in the diplomatic reception room of the White House, watching as all sorts of important figures spoke to the four winners of this scholarship. Other than Kevin and Chris there was a quiet boy a bit smaller than Chris. His brown hair and brown eyes made him disarming to look at, but also made him look a lot like a girl. The other boy had to be from some sort of U.S. territory, he had brown skin almost as dark as mine and he boasted loudly to any person who would listen.

The president still had not made an appearance, and the room buzzed about his whereabouts. Soon a great noise could be heard coming down the hallway, cameras and reporter's voices traveling toward us. The boy who looked like a girl seemed startled by it and flinched, while the other three grinned at the coming attention.

As soon as the president set foot into the room, throngs of reporters entered in with him shooting photos and asking questions to the four winners. As expected the smaller boy had ran to the end of the room where I was and attempted to hide. The other three however seemed more than prepared to take on the onslaught.

"Quite a lot of press don't you think," I said to the boy, who was almost hiding behind me.

"Yeah," he said quietly.

"Do you get the feeling though that something is up with this whole thing though." He stepped out from behind me and nodded.

"I thought I was the only one. I'm Blair by the way." I thought it was a fitting name for him. His black suit made him blend in with the other suits in the room but standing next to me made him stick out like a sore thumb. The reporters took note of this and rushed him pushing me out of the way to get a scoop. I walked over to the other room worried for him, he seemed so fragile who knew what would happen to him.

"This is awesome isn't it Dan," Chris said to me.

"I guess you could say that, I'm really happy for you and Kevin."

"I know right! Someone told me that after this ceremony well be put right on a flight to Japan."

"Oh," I said. Although they did say tomorrow they would be leaving.

The president got the attention up to him on the podium placed in the room. He gave a speech about the coming greatness of America and how these would be the first few duelist to learn and get a full education from Duel Academy. The president never looked assure of himself during the speech and he seemed just as scared for these duelist as Blair seemed for himself.

"I wish them the best of luck in their endeavors in the future." With that the reporters asked question after question as the president walked out of the room. The other members of the room made their way out as well and I had a feeling this thing was over.

"Chris," I said from across the room. Chris reached out to me but the moving crowd pushed us apart. It was the last time I would saw Chris that night, and I went to bed feeling empty.

The weeks without Chris and Kevin had been awfully dull. It did give me plenty of time to write back home to my dad. He lived on the other side of D.C. so I hardly ever got to visit him. For the past week we had been sending emails back and forth remembering what it was like to know the other. Since the end of this week his emails stopped coming. I waited for three days for a reply and got nothing. Where could he have gone? I reread his emails looking for some clue, nothing. He didn't say he was going anywhere so where could he be?

Eventually I just gave up waiting and decided to take this into my own hands. Clenching my ticket to the train I took the hour long ride to where we lived. Something about being on the train, watching the rest of the city speed by made life at ease. My shoulders didn't relax however and only get tenser as I tried to relax. I got back to where I lived and saw the red row houses and knew I was home. It was the late afternoon and people were just getting home. As I waved and said hi to neighbors I knew, they all looked away. By the time I got to my own house, they downright ran from me. What was going on around here? I unlocked the door to my house and was hit by a bad feeling. I saw police tape everywhere and felt dizzy. This couldn't be happening, not to me, not after so much already had.

The draft, my friends leaving me, and now no home to go back too? This had to be some kind of mistake, I went back outside checked the house number. Nothing was different this was my house and my sadness to take. I tore through the tape and slashed at anything in my way. I fought my way upstairs where I saw the door to my dad's room open. On the bed was a red stain, the most tape was in this room. I stopped doing everything, even breathing and simply looked at the bed. The tightness in my throat only made the feeling harder to get out and by the time I started breathing again it was a choking cry.

I punched the ground, again and again until something happened. Something that would bring my dad back. I ran to my own room and kicked down the door. I grabbed the bookcase and threw it to the ground, I tore pillows and threw pens and pencils to the ground in rage. I kicked the bed hard and saw something sticking out from the bottom, something I didn't recognize. I reached for it and saw it was a box.

"Dan," I heard a voice from below say. I hid the box immediately, if it were the police they would want to take it from me. If I were to keep anything from this house it was going to be this. Down the hallway I saw that the person had been Mr. Craig, the dean of Roosevelt.

"I'm sorry no one told you Dan," he said. Sorry? How could any word, any apology, any_thing_ make up for this?

"What happened," I yelled.

"No one knows, your dad was dead in the bedroom. No evidence to be found."

"There's always evidence! Fingerprints, weapons, even how he got in the fucking door!" Mr. Craig didn't have an answer for me. I punched a wall in the hallway and pushed my fist though the other side of the wall. I could feel the hand bleeding but I didn't care.

"This isn't fair, this isn't right. Why is this happening?"

"Dan this isn't your fault, lets just go back to school and we can sort this out ok?"

I didn't say anything, since I didn't know what to say. He led me outside the house and into his car. I watched as people from all over the neighborhood watched me ride away into the night. Away for the last time, maybe? I looked at the box I found in my room, it looked like a Christmas present. I had forgotten! I would have been able to go back home for Christmas and he might have planned to give it to me. I unwrapped it and saw it was a card with a note on it.

_Dear Dan, Welcome home! I know you never really liked the game but I figured it might be able to help you out anyway. It wasn't the only present I got you don't worry, but try to put it to good use._

_ ~Dad_

I looked at the card underneath and started to cry. Whether it was from joy or sadness it didn't matter, looking at this card I knew things were so much different now.


End file.
